Peacock Will Use an AI Version of Al Michaels To Create Personalized Olympic Recaps [CNET]

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NBC’s Peacock will be the streaming home of the 2024 Paris Olympics, with the company planning to broadcast 5,000 hours of live coverage from the upcoming Games, where “up to 40 Olympics events will be happening concurrently each day.” 

Keeping up with all of the action won’t be easy, which is why the streamer has created a new personalized recap show that will be tailored to your interests and voiced by an AI-generated version of legendary broadcaster Al Michaels. 

Called “Your Daily Olympic Recap on Peacock,” the streamer is utilizing generative AI and “AI voice synthesis technology” that recreates the voice of Michaels to introduce clips and summarize the action. 

Michaels, 79, is known for his decades-long career as a broadcaster that has had him as the voice behind iconic moments such as the “Miracle on Ice” during the 1980’s Winter Olympics as well as the lead play-by-play commentator for multiple World Series and Super Bowls. He spent years leading Monday Night Football on ABC and Sunday Night Football for NBC, and he now calls Thursday Night Football games for Amazon. 

“When I was approached about this, I was skeptical but obviously curious,” said Michaels in a statement accompanying the news. “Then I saw a demonstration detailing what they had in mind. I said, ‘I’m in.'”

The real version of Michaels will not be calling any events for NBC or Peacock during the Olympics. 

The recaps will be available inside Peacock’s Olympics hub and on the service’s homepage starting on July 27. From there, you will need to opt into the types of highlights you’re interested in as well selecting three favorite sports and “preferred topics” which range from behind-the-scenes footage and top competitions to “viral and trending moments.” Personalized recaps will begin on July 28 when the first full day of events begins. 

The recaps can be customized to each user on an account, so if you have multiple profiles each can get their own tailored rundown. The recaps will be viewable in web browsers on computers as well as in the Peacock app for iOS and iPadOS so long as they are running iOS 14 or iPadOS 14 or later. 

There is no support for Android devices, TVs or other platforms where the company has its app. These AI-ified Al Michaels recaps will be just for these Olympics and not available on other sports content that NBC produces such as the NFL.

Pulling from NBC Sports-produced clips, the highlight show will be a playlist that runs “around 10 minutes highlighting the most relevant moments from the prior day for each user, along with a look ahead to what fans can expect to see in the NBC Primetime show.” 

NBC says editors will “review all content, including audio and clips, for quality assurance and accuracy before recaps are made available to users.”